Just finished Binary Domain and i wanna talk about it (SPOILERS)

Hoooolyyyyyyyyyyyyy shit what an incredible game, i mean shooting wasn't that great except for the main assault rifle as long as you upgrade it up the arse but wow i seriously love this game. The quick look left a bad impression on me, it just seemed like a poor game but this game just got to me.

Big Bo, from the moment he said "Yeah, tell your mother i loved her" bloody best character i have seen and heard in a long time. The characters in this game (most of them anyway, brits couldn't care less about them, they just seemed like pricks or the dude anyway) they didn't feel like mindless drones they felt important unlike other games *cough* gears of war characters just seem dumb, who cares about dom and his wife *cough*.

Faye seemed like a bitch but then she comes around and decisions i made involving her made it feel like i was actually progressing the story with my choices but i suppose did the designers assume that the player would do those things and just ran with it? Anyway it totally worked on me and that makes this game all the more impressive to me.

Cain or the french robut, I felt he was a little talked up on the bombcast and such but still, great character and same thing with the choices and people you bring on your squad all felt like i was driving the story.

Boss fights seemed alright, varied enough and epic in proportions. It really felt like you were against all odds but you "survived."

Ending all that need to be said for my particular playthrough is poor Big Bo....

Cain never showed up even though i maxed his trust, Faye survives, brits survived (pretty surprised about that one) whats his name dude with the mohawk, thought that was a good end and overall i felt it was a good ending.

Fucken loved this game, another one of those games i would have never even considered if it wasn't for all the talking up on the bombcast, plus it was super cheap on GMG. If there is a Binary Domain 2 coming they got my money.

Sorry for the poorly written/structured crap here but i really needed to get that out, how did the ending go for all of you? i'm pretty interested to hear it.

On a completely unrelated note i started playing kingdoms of amalur, christ what a boring game.

Yeah, I liked it a lot as well. But it has been a while since I completed it and the memory has somewhat faded, I do consider giving it another spin, but my queue is busy post Steam sale.

Pretty much my thoughts. Wonderful game, great feel in the shooting, one of very few FPS/TPShooter of long I can imagine replaying. Thought it was AAA Western-made, ended up surprised seeing the Yakuza team behind it. Great game engine also, combat system, action scenes and just the flow, western developers should learn from this, it's how you make a roller-coaster ride!
 
 
Now.. did you actually upgrade your characters? It was only when I started a new game that I figured out how to equip those upgrades, thought they were automatic. No wonder I had a few challenging moments :D

Cain only shows up at the end if every character is max relation. Including Mohawk dude and the police inspector.

@SomeJerk: I sorta upgraded big bo at the start but thats it. i died alot.

I got my copy for a fiver of GMG last year and it became my favourite game of 2012.

I thoroughly enjoyed every second of it. It had a wonderful, unique story with plenty of interesting plot twists to keep you guessing and it was as competent a 3rd person shooter as any. Also, a great late title card (possibly the best ever).

I still need to play through to get the perfect ending and I'm looking forward to doing so.

I got Faye and Shindo at max trust (the latter thanks to that section of the game where you're stuck with him and it's easy to get headshots) but ended up with Big Bo dying and Cain not showing up. Watched the 'best' ending on Youtube and arguably Big Bo dying is carried off a little better (blasphemy, I know) but it's a shame many of the characters just seem to be left hanging like that. I suppose I wish the game was a little more... binary in how the endings work.

Got the after-credits sequence as well. Not sure if that's related to anything or if it just happens regardless.

All in all, I think it's surprisingly good as a third-person shooter and the story is serviceable. Definitely worth a shot at the bargain bin price you're likely to get it at now.

The music is surprisingly well written. Way better than I expected.

And the characters are just as good as Gears, don't hate it because it had more production money.

I lucked out and got the best ending without knowing the requirements or that there even were multiple endings. The ending where Big Bo dies is depressing though.

One of the most enjoyable games I played last year. Not sure what it was, but in a year I played Gears of War 3 and Binary Domain, I had a hell of a lot more fun with Binary Domain. Grew to like pretty much all the characters to be honest, even the cocky Brit (though it probably helped being British). Strangely the game told a pretty fascinating story to, something I wasn't expecting and the end was rather satisfying, well except for that strange ending with Faye and Dan going all outlaw!

I think a lot of it came down to the Japanese input for me. Can you imagine a Gears of War game stopping you in the middle of a mission to let some dude go to the bathroom?

Not sure what the current status is for a sequel, would love to see one though. Especially considering the world itself seemed pretty interesting.

Holla if you're dead....

:'(

Yup its a great fucking game, I hope more people play it since it is cheap now, it is a lot better than anyone would ever expect.

@Taku128: Wait there are multiple endings? WHAT?!

@Nightriff said:

@Taku128: Wait there are multiple endings? WHAT?!

if you and big bo aint cool, he betrays you and rachel dies saving you

if you and everyone else are highest rank, cain comes back and saves you without dying, and everyone's happy!

@Animasta said:

if you and big bo aint cool, he betrays you and rachel dies saving you

if you and everyone else are highest rank, cain comes back and saves you without dying, and everyone's happy!

.....Big Bo always dies right? If I remember correctly Bo "betrayed" me but ended up supporting me in the end and died....is that the bad ending?

@Nightriff said:

@Animasta said:

if you and big bo aint cool, he betrays you and rachel dies saving you

if you and everyone else are highest rank, cain comes back and saves you without dying, and everyone's happy!

.....Big Bo always dies right? If I remember correctly Bo "betrayed" me but ended up supporting me in the end and died....is that the bad ending?

It is a bad ending, but no he doesn't always die. He only lives in the best ending. There's actually a few variations depending on who you have trust with. Big Bo will or won't betray you depending on your trust with him, and if he does betray you you have to fight him. If you have high trust with Cain he'll come back and save Faye and not die since he's a robot, but if you don't have high trust with him he doesn't show up. If Cain didn't show up but you have high trust with Big Bo (thus avoiding the boss fight with him) he'll save Faye but die doing so. If you don't have high trust with either Rachel will die saving Faye.

I don't get why people feel the need to bash another game to try and praise a game they like.

@Taku128 said:

@Nightriff said:

.....Big Bo always dies right? If I remember correctly Bo "betrayed" me but ended up supporting me in the end and died....is that the bad ending?

It is a bad ending, but no he doesn't always die. He only lives in the best ending. There's actually a few variations depending on who you have trust with. Big Bo will or won't betray you depending on your trust with him, and if he does betray you you have to fight him. If you have high trust with Cain he'll come back and save Faye and not die since he's a robot, but if you don't have high trust with him he doesn't show up. If Cain didn't show up but you have high trust with Big Bo (thus avoiding the boss fight with him) he'll save Faye but die doing so. If you don't have high trust with either Rachel will die saving Faye.

...I'm pretty sure the only people I didn't max out were the Brits and even then I think I maxed out Rachel.....Cain I'm positive he was maxed since I used him every opportunity I could, probably other things at play in the story but I wasn't aware of alternate endings at all. Makes me want to play it again....

@Nightriff said:

@Taku128 said:

@Nightriff said:

.....Big Bo always dies right? If I remember correctly Bo "betrayed" me but ended up supporting me in the end and died....is that the bad ending?

It is a bad ending, but no he doesn't always die. He only lives in the best ending. There's actually a few variations depending on who you have trust with. Big Bo will or won't betray you depending on your trust with him, and if he does betray you you have to fight him. If you have high trust with Cain he'll come back and save Faye and not die since he's a robot, but if you don't have high trust with him he doesn't show up. If Cain didn't show up but you have high trust with Big Bo (thus avoiding the boss fight with him) he'll save Faye but die doing so. If you don't have high trust with either Rachel will die saving Faye.

...I'm pretty sure the only people I didn't max out were the Brits and even then I think I maxed out Rachel.....Cain I'm positive he was maxed since I used him every opportunity I could, probably other things at play in the story but I wasn't aware of alternate endings at all. Makes me want to play it again....

I've seen some people say that for Cain to show up you need high trust with everyone, but I've also seen people say you can have Cain show up even if Big Bo isn't high enough trust, so I'm not sure exactly how you get him to show up. I had decently high trust with everyone but had only maxed out Big Bo and Faye. If you didn't have Cain appear I guess that would confirm you need high trust with everyone. It's weird that Big Bo betrayed you though, I thought that was tied solely to his trust level.

@Taku128 said:

@Nightriff said:

@Taku128 said:

@Nightriff said:

.....Big Bo always dies right? If I remember correctly Bo "betrayed" me but ended up supporting me in the end and died....is that the bad ending?

It is a bad ending, but no he doesn't always die. He only lives in the best ending. There's actually a few variations depending on who you have trust with. Big Bo will or won't betray you depending on your trust with him, and if he does betray you you have to fight him. If you have high trust with Cain he'll come back and save Faye and not die since he's a robot, but if you don't have high trust with him he doesn't show up. If Cain didn't show up but you have high trust with Big Bo (thus avoiding the boss fight with him) he'll save Faye but die doing so. If you don't have high trust with either Rachel will die saving Faye.

...I'm pretty sure the only people I didn't max out were the Brits and even then I think I maxed out Rachel.....Cain I'm positive he was maxed since I used him every opportunity I could, probably other things at play in the story but I wasn't aware of alternate endings at all. Makes me want to play it again....

I've seen some people say that for Cain to show up you need high trust with everyone, but I've also seen people say you can have Cain show up even if Big Bo isn't high enough trust, so I'm not sure exactly how you get him to show up. I had decently high trust with everyone but had only maxed out Big Bo and Faye. If you didn't have Cain appear I guess that would confirm you need high trust with everyone. It's weird that Big Bo betrayed you though, I thought that was tied solely to his trust level.

Well he "betrayed" but I didn't fight him, he just held me up and did the "think I was going to shoot you" line, which I'm assuming always happens and that is where the max trust comes into play

@Nightriff said:

@Taku128 said:

@Nightriff said:

@Taku128 said:

@Nightriff said:

.....Big Bo always dies right? If I remember correctly Bo "betrayed" me but ended up supporting me in the end and died....is that the bad ending?

It is a bad ending, but no he doesn't always die. He only lives in the best ending. There's actually a few variations depending on who you have trust with. Big Bo will or won't betray you depending on your trust with him, and if he does betray you you have to fight him. If you have high trust with Cain he'll come back and save Faye and not die since he's a robot, but if you don't have high trust with him he doesn't show up. If Cain didn't show up but you have high trust with Big Bo (thus avoiding the boss fight with him) he'll save Faye but die doing so. If you don't have high trust with either Rachel will die saving Faye.

...I'm pretty sure the only people I didn't max out were the Brits and even then I think I maxed out Rachel.....Cain I'm positive he was maxed since I used him every opportunity I could, probably other things at play in the story but I wasn't aware of alternate endings at all. Makes me want to play it again....

I've seen some people say that for Cain to show up you need high trust with everyone, but I've also seen people say you can have Cain show up even if Big Bo isn't high enough trust, so I'm not sure exactly how you get him to show up. I had decently high trust with everyone but had only maxed out Big Bo and Faye. If you didn't have Cain appear I guess that would confirm you need high trust with everyone. It's weird that Big Bo betrayed you though, I thought that was tied solely to his trust level.

Well he "betrayed" but I didn't fight him, he just held me up and did the "think I was going to shoot you" line, which I'm assuming always happens and that is where the max trust comes into play

Oh okay. Yeah that happens if you have high trust with him, if you don't you have to fight him.

@LikeaSsur said:

The music is surprisingly well written. Way better than I expected.

And the characters are just as good as Gears, don't hate it because it had more production money.

I didn't like the characters in Gears one bit and that's not because it had more production money.

@Taku128 said:

@Nightriff said:

@Taku128 said:

@Nightriff said:

@Taku128 said:

@Nightriff said:

.....Big Bo always dies right? If I remember correctly Bo "betrayed" me but ended up supporting me in the end and died....is that the bad ending?

It is a bad ending, but no he doesn't always die. He only lives in the best ending. There's actually a few variations depending on who you have trust with. Big Bo will or won't betray you depending on your trust with him, and if he does betray you you have to fight him. If you have high trust with Cain he'll come back and save Faye and not die since he's a robot, but if you don't have high trust with him he doesn't show up. If Cain didn't show up but you have high trust with Big Bo (thus avoiding the boss fight with him) he'll save Faye but die doing so. If you don't have high trust with either Rachel will die saving Faye.

...I'm pretty sure the only people I didn't max out were the Brits and even then I think I maxed out Rachel.....Cain I'm positive he was maxed since I used him every opportunity I could, probably other things at play in the story but I wasn't aware of alternate endings at all. Makes me want to play it again....

I've seen some people say that for Cain to show up you need high trust with everyone, but I've also seen people say you can have Cain show up even if Big Bo isn't high enough trust, so I'm not sure exactly how you get him to show up. I had decently high trust with everyone but had only maxed out Big Bo and Faye. If you didn't have Cain appear I guess that would confirm you need high trust with everyone. It's weird that Big Bo betrayed you though, I thought that was tied solely to his trust level.

Well he "betrayed" but I didn't fight him, he just held me up and did the "think I was going to shoot you" line, which I'm assuming always happens and that is where the max trust comes into play

Oh okay. Yeah that happens if you have high trust with him, if you don't you have to fight him.

I liked the game a whole lot more until I discovered the stuff you two guys are talking about here and realized the trust system didn't really impact the game that much. Only Big Bo's trust seems to matter on an individual level. Plus Cain never showed up again for me either when he was built up to be a pretty great character. And Faye will love you even if you treat her like shit, from what I understand. These things all really soured me on the game after the fact.

@pyromagnestir said:

I liked the game a whole lot more until I discovered the stuff you two guys are talking about here and realized the trust system didn't really impact the game that much. Only Big Bo's trust seems to matter on an individual level. Plus Cain never showed up again for me either when he was built up to be a pretty great character. And Faye will love you even if you treat her like shit, from what I understand. These things all really soured me on the game after the fact.

But your trust with each member does matter except with Faye where you will have a relationship with her no matter what. Finding this out today has only impressed me more as I originally thought the trust system was some stupid thing making them more effective in combat, but it actually builds an ending based on it. Cain never showed up in the end for me whether that is based on the not everyone being a max trust or possibly other factors at work, that's really cool in my book, had my own little story that is different from others.

@Nightriff said:

@pyromagnestir said:

I liked the game a whole lot more until I discovered the stuff you two guys are talking about here and realized the trust system didn't really impact the game that much. Only Big Bo's trust seems to matter on an individual level. Plus Cain never showed up again for me either when he was built up to be a pretty great character. And Faye will love you even if you treat her like shit, from what I understand. These things all really soured me on the game after the fact.

But your trust with each member does matter except with Faye where you will have a relationship with her no matter what. Finding this out today has only impressed me more as I originally thought the trust system was some stupid thing making them more effective in combat, but it actually builds an ending based on it. Cain never showed up in the end for me whether that is based on the not everyone being a max trust or possibly other factors at work, that's really cool in my book, had my own little story that is different from others.

Only a little different. From what I gather the Big Bo's level affects whether he betrays you or not, and that's about it. And if you get everyone full trust Cain shows up and you get the best ending. That's the only variation. So why does my trust with Charlie, Rachel, and all the rest matter? It doesn't really. That bummed me out. If they'd gone more fully in that direction I'd have liked it better. But as I said my opinion only changed after I found all this out. I thought the ending I got, which sounds like the exact one you got, did seem to be based off my choices as it happened, except for Cain not showing up again as I had him at full trust. Maybe if instead of not showing up at all he showed up late and Bo still died it would've been better. I wanted more variation to match the cool trust system they'd built.

I didn't feel like making a new thread or writing a new review, but I just finished this via Playstation Plus and had some thoughts.

-- At first the shooting feels pretty bad, but by the time you've upgraded your accuracy, damage and health it slowly turns into a really fun shooting game. A lot of the robot destruction made me imagine (what I've seen of) Knack (via internet media) with some true creativity to it.

--So good that most of the distraction moments end up feeling even more boring than they are. I hated all the on-rails car sections, and failed ALL of the random "press O in the purple bar" QTEs 7 or 8 times before landing them.

--A lot of what I was responding to positively weren't objectively good things. The dialogue was terrible, a lot of the direction was frustratingly anime-like in execution and the voice acting was pretty stiff. I often felt like I was playing a Sci-Fi Original or blaxploitation game.

--Still, there were moments of actual brilliance. Most of the Hollow Children designs were great, as were all the scenes involving an exposed A.I. And the game was very smartly paced, even if I could tell early on we were swiftly moving on only to situations more ludicrous than the last. If they'd decided to commit to being an action game rather than an action-RPG, I can imagine a much better overall game being here. The length feels just right for the gameplay, but five-ten hours too short for the failed attempt at building characters or creating player agency.

--This game reminded me of the PS2 era in terms of how it controlled, how I felt confused about certain actions (randomly switching the mantle action to O instead of ^+X, never figuring out remote bombs), how very Japanese the storytelling felt...In a weird way, it felt like a nostalgia play even having never played it before.

--I'd like to see a sequel, but Binary Domain couldn't help but feel like a mimic of its betters (specifically Mass Effect and Blade Runner) and how often it made me laugh at its absurdity didn't always win out over how frustrating a few scenarios were. I didn't expect to breeze through this game as quickly as I did (4 or 5 days, mostly over the last two days) so I'd be lying if I said I didn't enjoy it, but without the robots or the interesting canonical backbone, I'd feel weird recommending this to anyone who likes this style of game but has no idea what "feels like a PS2-era video game developed in Japan with modern western trends super-glued on top in what almost feels like a satire-like fashion" means.

I just finished the game (it's free this month on PS+). Anyway, I absolutely enjoyed it! What a fun shooter. I really thought the aspects of the robots falling apart as you shot them was well done.

The story was fairly enjoyable as well. I wish Cain would have shown up at the end for me, but I still had a blast. Well worth the PS+ admission.

I enjoyed this game so much, I got it for about $5 from somewhere and have been recommending it to people whenever I can.

@mightyduck: just finished it as well (thanks ps+) and pretty much felt the same way as you.

I enjoyed this game a lot, though the end was extremely Japanese and the bosses have way too much HP on harder difficulties (doesn't make the game harder just more time consuming). Combat was fun and the last boss was engaging, characters are fantastic. A very easy and relaxing shooter.

Ditto. Just beat it today. Glad I took a chance on this game.

I really liked Binary Domain. I thought it was quite good.

This was one of my favorite experiences of the last generation. It was extremely impressive in terms of how it developed interesting characters as well as relationships with and between those characters. In all ways that mattered to me it was a superior experience than any of the Gears of War games.

I own this game on two platforms and have yet to finish it on either.

You monster.

lol i no right?

No, you are not right.

@konig_kei: it's a game that doesn't get enough praise. Shooting robots felt extremely satisfying and by God the dialog had heart. Just corny enough where it wasn't plain stupid.

I enjoyed it quite a bit and wouldn't mind a sequel - although I doubt it will happen.

I think that opening gave people an impression of what that game would be but was blown away with that serious transition towards the end.

Binary Domain has a lot of bizarre and goofy elements, but that is part of what makes it such a memorable and fun game. I really enjoyed my time with it, and even replayed it on Hard a couple months ago.

Few games are really worth replaying like that, and I'm glad that Binary Domain is one of them.

One thing I'll never understand about Binary Domain is that cover...

Just beat it. Pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed it.

To anyone who hasn't played it. It's a really standard (bordering mediocre, but not quite) 3rd person cover shooter with Japanese sensibilities. Think of it like the guys who made Yakuza played Mass Effect 2 and said "we can make that", then played Gears of War and said "this would probably be easier to make". It's linear, but has some weird loyalty stuff with your team mates that's akin to a really basic Mass Effect, and the gameplay is like a lesser version of mass effect 3, but it's not mission based and is very linear compared to Mass Effect (which is where the Gears comparison comes in). The characters/story/setting is surprisingly good. It's riddled with cliches and is probably cringe worthy in some instances, but I'm pretty sure it's intentionally so. It's subversion of American film stereotypes through the eyes of Japanese developers. Also, the story gets legitimately crazy.

I recommend it, especially since it's very cheap (I got it for free from ps plus awhile back).

I remember sprinting non-stop in the last boss fight.

I also remember I upgraded Bo's weapons and then realized why should I even bother upgrading any weapon except mine? Shooting robots toward the end was like butter.

The problem I have with this game actually has nothing to do with it specifically, it's just that Vanquish came out the same year and is a much better realization of "What if Gears was Japan."

Vanquish is way better on a gameplay front (top of the genre in my opinion), but in terms of character, world and story I think Binary Domain is leagues beyond it. Vanquish's story is dumb and funny but at the end of the day I don't actually care about any of the characters in that game, whereas I got attached to everyone in Binary Domain. (Well, aside from Rachel who has like five lines in the entire game)

From what I've played of Vanquish (like 3 or 4 hours) I 100% agree with you. Vanquish is one of the best controlling shooters ever made, but the story is kind of forgettable. Binary Domain is the complete opposite (forgettable gameplay, ridiculously insane story and memorable characters).

I played through it earlier this year and was really disappointed. Aside from some interesting story moments the game is pretty dull.